who
was betraying the city to its enemies. Kleon too attacked him, using the
anger which the citizens felt against him to advance his own personal
popularity, as we see from the following lines of Hermippus:

"King of Satyrs, wherefore fear you
Spear to wield, and only dare to
Talk in swelling phrase, while yet you
Cower, Teles like,
And when goaded on, past bearing,
By our Kleon's tongue so daring,
Only gnash your teeth despairing,
Still afraid to strike."

[Footnote A: The Dorians of Boeotia and Peloponnesus were accounted the
best infantry soldiers of Greece.]

XXXIV. Perikles was unmoved by any of these attacks, but quietly endured
all this storm of obloquy. He sent a fleet of a hundred ships to attack
Peloponnesus, but did not sail with it himself, remaining at home to
keep a tight hand over Athens until the Peloponnesians drew off their
forces. He regained his popularity with the common people, who suffered
much from the war, by giving them allowances of money from the public
revenue, and grants of land; for he drove out the entire population of
the island of Aegina, and divided the land by lot among the Athenians. A
certain amount of relief also was experienced by reflecting upon the
injuries which they were inflicting on the enemy; for the fleet as it
sailed round Peloponnesus destroyed many small villages and cities, and
ravaged a great extent of country, while Perikles himself led an
expedition into the territory of Megara and laid it all waste. By this
it is clear that the allies, although they did much damage to the
Athenians, yet suffered equally themselves, and never could have
protracted the war for such a length of time as it really lasted, but,
as Perikles foretold, must soon have desisted had not Providence
interfered and confounded human counsels. For now the pestilence fell
among the Athenians, and cut off the flower of their youth. Suffering
both in body and mind they raved against Perikles, just as people when
delirious with disease attack their fathers or their physicians. They
endeavoured to ruin him, urged on by his personal enemies, who assured
them that he was the author of the plague, because he had brought all
the country people into the city, where they were compelled to live
during the heat of summer, crowded together in small rooms and stifling
tents, living an idle life too, and breathing foul air instead of the
pur